The New Carinthia Lodge under construction this past summer will be ready for guests this winter. Courtesy photo.
by Maia Segura, Vermont Business Magazine Mount Snow ski resort is getting ready to go big for the 2018-2019 ski season. The final construction of an epic 42000 square foot, amenity-packed, base lodge is on track for the New Carinthia Lodge to open the first day of ski season. Also standing at the ready will be last year’s 220 new snow guns. Resort managers look forward to a powerful start to the season in November, with a little help from Mother Nature.
If last season is any indication, Mount Snow communications manager Jamie Storrs says, there is no doubt that the resort is in for a great year.
“We saw an uptick in visitation last year partially due to our $30 million investment in snowmaking, which allowed us to open more trails earlier and faster in the season than ever before, and partially due to the success of our Peak Pass (which) offers skiing and riding at seven resorts around the Northeast… We have seen great year-over-year growth in season pass holders,” he said. “With this increased growth in pass holders, it stands to figure that we’d have an increase in interest for this new lodge.”
The New Carinthia Lodge supplants the 57-year-old former Carinthia Lodge which was bulldozed earlier this summer to create premier parking for resort lift access. There is almost no comparison between the two lodges.
Going big with the new facility is an understatement. At 42,000 square feet, the $22 million, three story building is 405% bigger than the old lodge. The heated slopeside deck alone, flanking two floors with two epic upward folding glass doors divided by an indoor/outdoor fire place, covers more ground than the old lodge at its 9000 square feet.
The new restaurant will have a 151% increase in the number of seats at 626. Impressively, commode seats will be increased as well by 323% from 13 to a total of 55 toilets. These will come in handy to service the two bars included in the plan.
Other additions to the new facility include a full-sized Mount Snow Sports shop complete with hard goods, soft goods, and rentals, as well as changing, bag storage, and locker facilities. There will also be a convenience store and youth activity room.
Although Peak Resorts doesn’t comment on projected earnings, it is not likely to hurt the bottom line that Mount Snow was recently rated as the top resort in the Northeast by Transworld Snowboarding and Newschoolers.
“With some of the most consistent snow surface conditions and a brand-new lodge at the base of the number one park in the East, we are expecting to see a bump in visits for this coming season,” said Storrs.
Despite the hearty investments in ski-oriented amenities which will go hand in hand with even more investment in snowmaking, the project aims to go beyond winter with a flexible multi-purpose space suitable year-round for weddings, conferences, and special events which resort owners hope will appeal to locals and tourists alike.
To take advantage of the lush Vermont spring, summer, and fall, giant fold-up door windows will open on to the deck. But as things heat up, the entire space will be air conditioned, an amenity which currently only exists in one section of the Main Base Lodge.
All of this bodes well for what Dick Deutsch, president of Mount Snow and vice president of business and real estate development at Peak Resorts noted as, “the commitment that Peak Resorts has for Mount Snow, and the bright future we see for the area.”
The town of Wilmington felt the impacts of the improvements at Mount Snow and the Peak Pass during last year’s season.
“Because of the snowmaking, people last year came earlier than normal, and Mount Snow was open,” said Gretchen Havreluk, Town of Wilmington economic development manager. “The Peak Pass and New Carinthia Lodge will have a larger impact on revenue this year.”
“We are excited about the Mount Snow season this year,” said John Gannon, Wilmington resident and Vermont State Representative for Windham-6. Gannon cites the West Lake project for bringing snowmaking capacity from 70% to 100%, which last year extended the ski season from an average of 140 days to 163 days.
“It’s exciting that they were able to extend the season by 23 days. That’s 23 more days that visitors are coming into our local retail shops and buying meals in our restaurants,” he said.
The future does appear to be brightening for the area. Interest increased in vacant buildings in Wilmington this summer fueled by theMake it on Main Street promotion. This effort brought in 19 proposals for a shark tank style competition for $20,000 in seed money for a new business proposed for downtown Wilmington. This response indicates that investors and potential business owners see the economy swinging back in the area.
One property at the crossroads of Main Street and Route 100 that has been vacant since Hurricane Irene in 2011 will now be the location of a new brewery. The Maple Leaf Tavern on Route 100 also sold at auction and will reopen as a tavern.
Additionally, the local Nutmeg Inn has reached a deal with Lorista Holdings to handle room rentals at the iconic Vermont House on West Main Street, which was previously leased through the Hermitage Club.
With increased visitors comes the need to supply enough workers to meet the demand, an issue which has left local businesses grappling. The local unemployment rate was down to 3.3% in June, which didn’t leave much room to find summer seasonal workers. A crippling labor shortage caused many businesses to scale back hours or days that they are open.
“One restaurant closed two days per week, (but has) now reopened seven days,” said Havreluk. “And another could not open a section of the restaurant up until a few weeks ago.”
If the shortage continues as projected, it could mean that an increase in visitors this winter may not translate to an increase in prosperity for local businesses.
Across the Deerfield Valley, Haystack Mountain, wracked with financial doomsday for the better part of the year as a part of Hermitage Club, is stirring up rumors that a deal may be reached in time for the mountain to reopen for the impending ski season.
Earlier this year, Berkshire Bank filed a foreclosure complaint against the Hermitage Club for failing to repay over $17 million in mortgage notes across multiple hospitality and resort properties in the Wilmington and Dover areas.
A groomer plies its way up Haystack for the Hermitage Club during good days. VBM file photo.
Among these is the members-only Haystack Mountain ski resort containing lift equipment, inns, townhouses, and a golf course. In early July, Hermitage Club members, under the receivership of court-appointed Alan Tantleff of FTI Consulting, have been granted access to facilitate due diligence to lease Haystack Mountain for continuous use during the upcoming ski season.
In the meantime, Hermitage Club founder Jim Barnes announced that he is “finalizing terms” for a restructuring deal with New York-based Oz Real Estate. (Oz was the lease holder of Okemo Mountain Resort in Ludlow and two other resorts and received $155 million when Vail Resorts bought Okemo, Sunapee (NH) and Crested Butte (CO) in June).
New Hermitage Club president Harper Silbey said 209 members voted in a “non-binding straw poll”in favor of a deal where, with 27 percent ownership, Barnes would no longer be the majority stakeholder of the company. Members in turn would own 41 percent, although their dues would increase by 57% to $15,000 per year. Oz would own 30 percent. Also under the plan, contractors and vendors who are still seeking payment on outstanding debts would have the option of trading the debt for a small percentage of ownership.
While a majority of the folks who voted did so in favor of the plan, votes fell short of the projected 400 required to move forward. With 160 members voting against the plan and 165 abstaining, it will be a battle to reach necessary votes to seal the deal. Unable to access their homes and amenities, trust has clearly been broken with many members.
The two proposals are not mutually exclusive, but neither one guarantees that Haystack will open this year, given that there are many steps in the process to close either deal.
“There is a lot to this,” said Havreluk.
According to John Gannon, himself a Hermitage Club member, “There is much talk of deals but there currently is no completed transaction.”
He said, “Winter seems far off from us here…but there is a lot of work and money that goes into operating a ski mountain. From the most recent report, it appears that the (Haystack Mountain) receiver feels that it is unlikely that the mountain will reopen this winter.”
Even if the resort was to reopen this winter, it is questionable from where workers would come to staff the facility. Hermitage Club in the past has relied on the Federal H-2B visa program to fill open positions at the resort in part to combat the limited labor pool in the area. The H-2B program allows US employers or US agents who meet specific regulatory requirements to bring foreign nationals to the United States to fill temporary jobs.
Here that translates to multitudes of foreign workers finding employment in the winter hospitality industry. There is a cap set for the number of visas allowed each year and it’s too late to receive help from the 33,000 workers nationally who are allowed visas to begin employment in the first half of the fiscal year (October 1 - March 31).
If Hermitage Club were able to sidestep H-2B, its record of treatment and non-payment of recent employees would pose a tremendous challenge to tapping into the local labor pool.
Opinions are varied on the impact on the local economy if closure of the Hermitage Club and Haystack Mountain continues this winter. A report to Gannon and Vermont Representative Laura Sibilia (I-Windham/Bennington), based on a survey of 80 businesses across sectors in the Wilmington and Dover areas, concluded that most businesses adopted a “wait and see” attitude.
But the best guess was a 10% to 20% loss in business if the Hermitage Club does not come back online.
The report, conducted by economic development consultants from Wilmington and Dover, the Southern Vermont Deerfield Valley Chamber of Commerce, and Wilmington Works last April, found that the anticipated impact varied by sectors.
According to the report, results by sector showed:
Dining/Retail/Lodging/Recreation: Hard to gauge. The Club only recently "shut down" and within a week or two of when they usually close for the season. Members were still coming to their second homes and visiting The Club up until the closure on April 1st. Another factor is that most of the business owners are not asking their patrons if they are club members or visiting the club, so it is hard to tell if the visitation has dropped off among that demographic recently. Finally, most dining and retail establishments say that it is difficult to estimate a drop in business related to this issue when the ski season in the valley has been fantastic through the month of March and into April, which is typically when the visitation would be down regardless.
Services: It appears that many of the contractors and service businesses in the Valley, either after personal experience or word of mouth, had seen something like this coming and distanced themselves from the projects at The Club. There are still a number of contractors throughout the Valley who are owed money for services and materials, and many of them are listed in the open litigation against The Club. There are still a number of contractors (both local and non) who continue to do work for The Club are being paid on retainer for time and materials.
Real Estate: Agents and Brokers in the Valley are seeing a large effect from The Club’s issues. The brokers are saying they are doing their best to make sure the market for housing in the area remains stable as some club members are trying to dump property in the wake of the issues. Agents we spoke to have reported a slight decline over last year in people seeking second/vacation homes near The Club and the surrounding area. One broker has done an analysis and says that sales of homes $400-500k+ was half of what it was in the first quarter of last year. They have said the lower end of the market ($150-$300k) seems to be remaining stable for the time being.
Empty and deteriorating buildings in both Towns owned by the Hermitage Club or associates bringing down property values and affecting the facade work that has been done since the flood.
According to Gretchen Havreluk, one of the authors of the report, while businesses were concerned about the prospect of a closure, most did not think a winter without the Hermitage Club would be devastating. Eyes seem to be focused on the very likely scenario that the resort will reopen eventually.
“We’ve lived without the Hermitage and Haystack before,” she said. “The chances of Haystack opening this winter are 50/50, but people are confident that if not this winter, it will happen eventually.”
“I hope somebody comes along and closes a transaction in time for this winter, but at this point it is unlikely that this will happen,” said Gannon. “The Hermitage Club has built incredible assets for this area, and its members have been important to our restaurants and retail shops, so we hope that it comes back online soon.”
Maia Segura is a freelance writer from Windham County.